Heart of the Aspects wasn't a hint, they used the skeleton of the MoP dragons because presumably they'd just started making them at the time. The skeleton was then skinned to look like the glowy thing the Dragon Soul shot at Deathwing.

So unless you're saying the Fey Dragon uses a model that is recognisably something else which points to a specific expansion, then no it's not the same thing at all.

In short, it's a cool looking mount and maybe Blizzard has a purpose for it and maybe not, but no it isn't a hint of the next expansion. Blizzard doesn't drop hints, they would tell you if they wanted you to know.

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Originally Posted by Aeluron Lightsong

And yet Dawn of the Aspects says the Rift of Aln is disturbing and looking for another Nightmare Lord. I don't think we'll get whole era about the Dream but something slightly related.

1) Book lore, blecch.
2) Generic story hook left around in case they ever want to revisit it - which they keep saying they don't.

I can not see Blizzard jumping into ED straight after MoP. They're way too similar.

They're not even close. The only segue is that Ancients and Celestials are confirmed as one in the same, but it appears they have their Timeless Isle, which has a lot of similarities to the Emerald Dream. That said the Emerald Dream makes far more interesting subject matter than yet another stupid, moronic storyline involving a Legion invasion .

imo the only way a Legion expansion would be new and exciting is if the made Velen, Mr. Army of the Light and Prophet BSer extraordinaire a Herald for the Legion and the one who masterminded the whole plan to get all the Legion's enemies in one area and crush it (with his dopey, stomach churning Army of Light crap).

If they did that, then bring it on cause wow what a twist. Otherwise who cares about the crappy, weak, legion and their pathetic attempts to attack Azeroth yet again.

If it's not an elf, leave it on the shelf.Night Elf Liberation Front N.E.L.F.
Something mean about trolls.

Anyone who says the Rift of Aln and the Emerald Nightmare are dealt with is wrong and should stop spreading misinformation.

Thank you!

Originally Posted by leaks

Well it's good to see the keyboard activists in full effect. Doing the laziest, most asinine thing they could think of off the top of their heads and calling it justice while making no difference.

Originally Posted by C9H20

Blizzard effectively wants to have its cake and eat it too by pretending to have this groundbreaking war in a faction capital while at the same time being completely unwilling to portray logical consequences of such an event.

Take a look at the four Celestials. They're based off the Four Symbols, mythological creatures and constellations. There, the four are the Azure Dragon Qinglong (East), the Vermilion Bird Zhuque (South), the White Tiger Baihu (West), and Black Tortoise Xuanwu (North). Their counterparts in the Celestials moved around a bit, changed color and animal (Azure to Jade, Tiger from West to North, Tortoise to Ox, etc), but the connection is there.

However, there is sometimes a fifth Guardian Beast that joins those four: Huang Long, the Yellow Dragon.

Now, I'm not saying its a hint, but it is kind of curious, wouldn't you say?

Heart of the aspects and the faery dragon mount are both epic flying mounts released at or near the end of an expansion. Celestial Steed was the standard raid theme mount of Ulduar so that's completely irrelevant.

Folks, the heart of the aspects might not be exactly like the cloud serpents, but it's still a serpentine dragon that's very similar. With blizzard's tendency to drop subtle hints and their fondness of reusing models/animations, it's still highly plausible that this thing relates to the next expansion.

Take a look at the four Celestials. They're based off the Four Symbols, mythological creatures and constellations. There, the four are the Azure Dragon Qinglong (East), the Vermilion Bird Zhuque (South), the White Tiger Baihu (West), and Black Tortoise Xuanwu (North). Their counterparts in the Celestials moved around a bit, changed color and animal (Azure to Jade, Tiger from West to North, Tortoise to Ox, etc), but the connection is there.

However, there is sometimes a fifth Guardian Beast that joins those four: Huang Long, the Yellow Dragon.

Now, I'm not saying its a hint, but it is kind of curious, wouldn't you say?

That is an interesting connection, but the gold color of it was just a color established in Twilight of the Aspects novel. The combined Dragon Aspects power created gold, so they made a gold dragon. One with a unique model so they could sell it.

Huang Long will actually kind of be in-game next patch, Shaohao rep can give a Heavenly Golden Cloud Serpent, Shao hao being next to the four celestials on the timeless isle. I'd consider that mount closer to Haung Long than the Heart of the Aspects.

I'd rather not deal with the Emerald Dream just yet since the story would be so Old God focused. The Nightmare's really neat and N'zoth seems like a real menacing fella, but I'm not a fan of the idea of four expansions in a row with a heavy Old God presence. Developing the Old Gods is great but developing them so much in a row and leveraging them so often has begun to dull their spook-factor.
A total absence of the eldritch in whatever's coming next would be a good idea, I think.

I swear blizz could tell people to there face that the next xpack is going to be the legion and you would still think its going to be the Emerald Dream. How many more hints does blizz have to throw at you with the black prince.

Not a new or original theory by any means.
It has been discussed many times about that mount being a "hint".

The previous "mount hint" was not based on lore, but simply on appearance.
Bit of a stretch, given that there are lots of things you can take from visuals if you look hard enough.
Players are predicting expansions from the presence of a single NPC or quest, or in this case a mount.

Originally Posted by Hardstyler01

Well, the model was based on the asian dragons from MoP, you can't deny that.

We can see a resemblance.
"Based on" ? That is not confirmed to be a fact, and could still be a coincidence.
We can deny that very easily.

Probably already been said, but the heart of the aspects was just them getting use from the new skeleton, less of an intentional Asian theme and more trying to make the most of the skeleton in the store before it became too recognizable.

As much as I'd like the idea of foreshadowing content with other content, Blizzard don't have a good record with that. The spectral steed and vampire bat both looked good, but had absolutely no relevance to any content to either side of their release. It seems like they just make a cool idea for the mount and sell it. The heart was just done on the cheap.